So what?
At the beginning of the year, we had a small, girl heavy class. Lots of opportunities to push learning, essential words, high frequency words, phonics - and we had a group of willing participants who were ready to pick up and run with whatever we threw at them.
Come to the third term, and we have a new cohort who are different - and to use the term I loathe - not "school ready".
First off, the small group from the start of the year has made great strides.
The three samples above show a range of ability across the board, using a two-part picture plan that has been done independently. I never really get to this stage without providing a lot of support, and generally this is by term 4. It shows me that at a guided session, there is a lot I can work with to push writing forward.
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So what does all this mean? I am left with more questions than answers.
For this small group, all but one who has been at school for a year - they have definitely been ready for the introduction of level one curriculum - high frequency words, essential words, word of the week, phonics - they lap it up and put in a lot of work themselves in their own time.
Secondly - they are girls. Can I even introduce gender bias into this?
After today's lesson, I still have some misgivings around pushing too soon.
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ReplyDeleteKia Ora Denise
ReplyDeleteYes! I believe you can use the term 'School Ready' as for myself coming from an ECE background, where we were set on assisting tamariki to be 'school ready' I can see that a lot of our tamariki and their whānau, are not ready for school learning.
I notice a lot of the girls in my class are keen to sit and write, or to create something through writing and drawing, where the boys have taken a good 6 months, or more, to settle into the rhythm of creating stories or words, so you are definitely not alone in noticing that trend. However, I guess it's how we allow them the time to explore literacy, in their own time, that counts and can make or break their passion for learning. I have two boys in my class who have just all of a sudden picked up whiteboards and write words, lots and lots of word's, do they make sense? not always, are they spelt correctly? not always, but we absolutely celebrate the fact that they are picking up a pen and writing! This is the part of teaching I really enjoy, seeing the look of pride on their faces is quite overwhelming.